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previous: Chapter 18 This webpage reproduces a chapter of The Five Civilized Tribes by Grant Foreman University of Oklahoma Press Norman, Oklahoma, 1934 The text is in the public domain. This page has been carefully proofread and I believe it to be free of errors. If you find a mistake though, please let me know! next: Chapter 20

[ Seminole ]

 p255  Chapter nineteen
Intrigues of Wild Cat

The Seminole Indians suffered at every turn from the injustice and ineptitude of Federal policy. Next to the thinly veiled fraud that characterized the so‑called Treaty⁠1 of 1833 the most conspicuous of the wrongs perpetrated by the Government on these Indians was the fatuous effort to amalgamate them with the Creek tribe in the West. In the same category though of lesser possibilities for mischief was the duplicity and vacillation of the Government relating to their Negro slaves. Contention and confusion almost resulting in bloodshed and tribal demoralization were caused by the action of the Government.

To facilitate the subjugation of the Indians in Florida Gen. Thomas S. Jesup told a number of these slaves that if they would surrender and agree to emigrate they should be emancipated; and that when they arrived in the West they were to be permitted to settle in a village to themselves in the manner in which they had been accustomed to live in Florida,⁠2 under the protection of the United States, never to be separated or sold.⁠3

 p256  On these terms several hundred Seminole slaves surrendered and were removed to the West. Jesup was succeeded in the command of the forces in Florida by Gen. Zachary Taylor who told the Seminole Indians that those who surrendered and agreed to emigrate would be secure in their property, including their slaves. Here were conflicting elements sufficient to produce confusion and misunderstanding, but they were complicated by another. The Creek Indians who volunteered for service against the Seminole Indians in the Florida War were promised as booty all the Seminole slaves they might capture. Expediency dictated the policy of the Government no matter how inconsistent and unjust, leading to untold evil possibilities. A conflict of policy and interest and endless contention resulted which seriously interfered with the adjustment of the immigrant Indians.

The efforts of the Creeks to sell their captive slaves to a white man were nullified by the army officers who aided the Seminole Indians in bringing them to Fort Gibson. But this was only the beginning of the trouble. The fear that the Creeks would attempt to take some of the Negroes was one of the insuperable obstacles that prevented the Seminole Indians from removing on the Creek domain set apart for them and therefore one of the influences that kept them for several years in a state of unrest, confusion and discontent living around Fort Gibson, arresting all efforts to reëstablish themselves.

After the arrival of the Seminole Indians with their slaves in the West, the confusion that arose out of the situation gave rise to conflicting claims to certain slaves. Kidnapers were busy running some of them far away and disposing of them. Freeborn Negroes of the tribe were captured and sold into bondage. The Negroes complained to the officers at Fort Gibson and made much of the promise of General Jesup to secure them in their freedom. The situation existed for several years and when General Jesup arrived at Fort Gibson in 1845 to plan the construction of the new fort, some of the Negroes came to  p257 see him and ask for the fulfillment of his agreement. When he told them that his promise was in full force and effect and that they were entitled to their liberty, several hundred of them left their owners and some of them came to the post, where they were given sanctuary and the protection of the military against efforts to remove them. Between sixty and seventy of them were employed in the construction of the new stone fort. Subsequently the Seminole owners and Creek claimants made repeated efforts to secure the Negroes.

When the tripartite Treaty of 1845⁠4 was made between the United States, the Creek and Seminole nations, section three was entered into for the express purpose of settling this vexatious question, which was therein referred to the President for determination. By virtue of that article the president referred the question to the attorney general, who after long delay, rendered an elaborate opinion in the summer of 1848 in which he decided that the Negroes should be restored to the condition in which they were prior to the intervention by General Jesup. The President approved the report and gave orders for carrying the opinion into effect.

Plans were thereupon made by General Arbuckle then in command at Fort Smith to have the slaves delivered to their Seminole owners at Fort Gibson on December 22, 1848. Gen. W. G. Belknap was in command at Fort Gibson and instructions were given him for making the delivery.⁠5 The weather was very cold and the Seminole Indians not having become accustomed to the climate, were unable to reach the post on time so that the delivery did not take place until January 2, 1849.

What otherwise would have been a festive occasion for the Indians was made sad by the sudden death of their chief Mikanopy on the day of his arrival at the post to receive his slaves. The Seminole were greatly attached to their venerable leader who had done what he could to sustain them during their recent trials, and had made every effort to reëstablish them in the West.⁠6

The Negroes delivered that day numbered 286, of whom 108 had surrendered to General Taylor in Florida; of these fifty-nine were  p258 claimed by Mikanopy, six by Echo Hadjo, seventeen by Billy Bowlegs, and twenty by Nelly Factor. Of another list that were brought in to Fort Jupiterº by August and Latta, twenty-seven were claimed by Nelly Factor, nineteen by Mikanopy, eleven by Holotoochee, thirteen by Bill Bowlegs, ten by Harriett Bowlegs, ten by Echo Hadjo, and the remainder by Charley Emathla and Miccopotok. Of another list that had surrendered at Pease Creek one was claimed by Harriet Bowlegs, sixteen by Billy Bowlegs, and four by Holotoochee.

The Negroes were called into the chapel where General Belknap formally turned them over to the Seminole chiefs to whom he gave some advice and instructions — that they should not sell the Negroes, and should treat them well and not punish them for things done in Florida.

The delivery was made by the military amidst sullen resentment of Creek and white claimants. The Creek chiefs disapproved of Negroes who were to enjoy a modified form of slavery and live within the limits of their country. A conspicuous one of these Negroes was Gopher John⁠7 who had served as guide and interpreter for the army officers in Florida. The Seminole council presided over by Mikanopy in 1843 made an order declaring him to be a free Negro.⁠8 He had been useful to their tribe and in 1845 for sixty days was engaged with his wagon and three yoke of oxen in removing some of the Seminole Indians and their baggage from near Fort Gibson to Little River. Being a free Negro he was in daily fear of being killed by some of the Seminole who tried to shoot him on one occasion when they killed his horse instead. So he went to Washington to see General Jesup and secure permission to return to Florida where his life and liberty would be more secure. But he returned to the Indian Territory.

Gopher John was a smart Negro and exercised much influence over the others who looked to him for leader­ship. When they were turned over to the Seminole tribe he conducted them to a place to set up their town separate from the Indians in the manner in which they lived in Florida and according to the customs of the Seminole Indians. This settlement bore the name of Wewoka and was located about thirty  p259 miles from the Seminole agency. This arrangement was satisfactory to the Seminole Indians but not to the Creeks within whose territory the Seminole were unwittingly located. They would have had little to complain of but for the burning and deep-seated resentment of individuals at being deprived of the slaves they had captured in Florida, and of the long standing claims of some of them to slaves who many years before had fled to Florida and been protected by Seminole.

These slaves knew as soon as they left the protection of the military at Fort Gibson they were in daily peril of being kidnaped and they armed themselves with knives, guns and pistols. This the Creeks claimed to be a violation of their laws, and said they would not tolerate it. Another difficulty and cause of trouble in the country was the fact that the Seminole agent, Marcellus DuVal, had a brother William J. DuVal, an attorney, who claimed to have performed valuable services for the Seminole Indians in securing the delivery of the Negroes to them. He professed to have had a contract with the Indians which provided that he should have one‑third of the slaves recovered for his services.

There had been much friction between the Seminole and the Creeks over the Negroes, and the year before Wild Cat had cut off the ears of young Tallassee to satisfy some grievance. The Creeks were much exercised about this summary treatment of a member of their tribe and planned reprisal on the Seminole chief. A large crowd of them went to his home and held a dance during which they intended to carry out their program. But in the darkness and confusion they laid hold of the wrong man and beat him nearly to death, the wily Coacoochee easily escaping their clutches.⁠9 There was intense excitement and further trouble between the tribes was feared.

The agent was very bitter at General Arbuckle for holding that the Seminole Indians were obligated not to sell their slaves by the promise made them in Florida by Jesup. DuVal wrote numerous letters complaining of the attitude of the military which interfered with the performance of the contract with his brother. The Indians had been told also that no contracts for sale of any of the slaves made prior to the delivery of the Negroes could be executed. DuVal called on Arbuckle  p260 for a force to disarm the Negroes for the apparent purpose of carrying out the contract made with his brother and taking possession of them. Arbuckle told him that it was impossible to send a force for this purpose as there were 180 cases of cholera in his command of 193 men at Fort Smith, and the eighty-six soldiers at Fort Washita were busily engaged in erecting quarters for themselves and troops coming to that post from New Mexico.⁠10

At this point Coacoochee entered the controversy. He came with some of the Seminole chiefs and warriors to Fort Smith to see General Arbuckle and protest against the delivery of the Negroes to DuVal's brother as he said the owners of the slaves were not consulted about the contract which was made by Jim Jumper before he became chief.⁠11

Coacoochee or Wild Cat was a remarkable man of conspicuous intellect, easily the shrewdest man in the tribe. He was the son of King Philip, an influential chief in Florida. When he went to Washington in 1844 he was greatly impressed by the power of the United States and he returned home correspondingly impressed with his own importance and that of his people who had been able through six years to defy ten times as many well trained and provisioned soldiers of the great Republic. The army officers regarded him as a man of great force and predicted that he would some day become chief. However on the death of chief Mikanopy he was succeeded as chief by Jim Jumper (Micco-nut-char-sar), probably the son of the Chief Jumper who died at New Orleans during the removal. Whether Wild Cat was disappointed at not being made chief to succeed Mikanopy does not appear from available records but that was probably the case. At any rate after Jumper became chief and sought to commit the slave-holding members of the tribe to a deal whereby the agent's brother would obtain a large part of their slaves, Wild Cat began to make plans to leave the Indian Territory for another home, and sought to influence some of the Seminole Indians to accompany him.

He was a resourceful and ambitious man and his efforts excited considerable interest and apprehension among the Indians and the officers of the Government. He had engaged in trading expeditions among the prairie Indians⁠12 and the Comanche especially looked up to him as a  p261 man to be respected and cultivated. He had become familiar with the southwestern country far toward the Mexican border and entertained a scheme for setting up an Indian colony in that region of which he would be the head. The injustice to which he and his people had been subjected by the Government burned deep into his soul and he had never forgiven the authors of these wrongs. Brought a prisoner from the home of his birth he had never reconciled himself to the change as some of his people had, and consistently refused to conform to the plans of the Government, settle on the lands of the Creeks and become subject to their domination.

Before the Seminole delegation left North Fork Town in October, 1849, for Florida, Wild Cat conferred with them and their agent. He made a proposition to DuVal which he wished conveyed to the President. He said that his people were dissatisfied with their present situation with the Creeks and desired to remove with him to Mexico; and if the President would favor the enterprise he would get Bowlegs and the remainder of the Seminole in Florida to remove to that country, whereas they would never willingly locate in the Creek country. But, DuVal said, Wild Cat secretly told members of the delegation to advise Bowlegs and his people to hold on until he could induce the Government to make a treaty by which they could remove with him to the Rio Grande. Wild Cat was not hostile to the Government said DuVal, "but he is ambitious and would want to cut a figure in the world; would wish the Govt. to believe he is controlling and holding in check the Wild Indians of the Prairies & would at the same time convince the Indians that he was only playing the part of a skillful diplomatist in deceiving Govt. for their benefit."⁠13

The Creek leaders played into Coacoochee's hands by their determination to possess the slaves of the Seminole. They had declared that no town of free Negroes or Negroes in a form of qualified slavery such as those of the Seminole, should be permitted to exist within the limits of their nation. They passed a law prohibiting any free Negro living among them and prohibiting any Negro from possessing arms.  p262 An incredible amount of controversy and disturbing contention revolved around this situation. And Wild Cat had no trouble in inducing some of the Negroes to accompany him on his adventure to Mexico where they would be free. With twenty or twenty-five warriors and their families and a large number of Negroes headed by Gopher John, some Creeks and Cherokee, he set out early in the winter of 1849‑50 and made a temporary stopping place on Cow Bayou, a branch of the Brazos River, in the vicinity of the residence of a number of Kickapoo Indians. Here they were to remain and make a crop while Wild Cat cultivated the Indians in the neighborhood and attached them to his enterprise. Wild Cat had left word that any whites or Creeks who undertook to follow him would be killed.⁠14 He was "determined to entice away as many Indians as possible and settle in Mexico where he will not have to contend with rival chiefs. He is a cunning, ambitious man, and is not willing to be less than head of the tribe."⁠15 According to the San Antonio Western Texas of June 6, there were 700 or 800 "Seminole, Lipan, Wago and Tankawah Indians under command of Wild Cat encamped on the Llano."⁠16 Some Cherokee and Creek slaves accompanied him and it was thought they were to learn the route and then act as guides in running off others to join his colony.

The Creeks determined to take a number of the Seminole Indians remaining in the Negro town and on June 24 a party of them accompanied by several white citizens and a few Cherokee "arrived in the vicinity of Wewoka, Seminole Nation, manned and equipped. I soon learned that their object was to take forcible possession of a number of Negroes at that time residing in the Seminole nation known as the Seminole Negroes, but claimed by some of the leaders of the aforesaid party. Much excitement was produced among the Seminole people in the vicinity, as the object of these men was not clearly known to them, and when they did learn that it was their intention to attack the Negro town, many of them painted themselves for war and asserted their firm determination to assist the Negroes in defending themselves." The military authorities at Fort Smith under Capt. Frederick T. Dent then interposed and warned Agent DuVal and Chief McIntosh of the Creeks to use their authority to prevent what might bring on a war  p263 between the two tribes. Under this pressure the Creek force withdrew to the north side of the North Fork River. A council was then held between the leaders of the two tribes and it was agreed that the Creeks might take a number of Negroes claimed by them. About 180 Negroes accordingly were taken to the Seminole agency where they were held to prevent their flight to join Wild Cat in Texas and from giving information to him and support to that many more who fled and planned to join him. The fugitives were led by Jim Bowlegs, a slave of Billy Bowlegs of Florida. The leaders of the Creeks and the individual white men and Cherokee who were engaged in this effort to capture these slaves were "Nunin" McIntosh, Siah Hardage, Tom Carr, Joe Smith and John Lilly, Creeks; William Drew, Dick Drew, and Martin Vann, Cherokee; P. H. White of Van Buren, I. M. Smith of Fort Smith, one Matthews a trader near the Creek agency and Gabriel DuVal, a brother of the agent, from Montgomery, Alabama, white men.⁠17

Wewoka was within the limits of the Creek Nation as then defined. The Creek authorities were determined that its law forbidding free Negroes from residing within the Nation should be respected, and enforced, even if they were obliged to resort to force of arms to bring it about. The Creeks said that if the Negroes were free they should not remain in the Creek Nation: on the other hand if they were slaves they must be under the control, care and custody of their owners in accordance with the established custom of the tribe. The Creeks refused to recognize the custom that had prevailed between Seminole Indians and their slaves of permitting them to reside in separate towns. "On more than one occasion the Creek people as one man, had determined to take the matter in hand and with rifle and ball disarm the Negroes and turn them over to their masters, or drive them from the country," said Philip N. Raiford and John Drennan, Indian officials, though their real purpose was to secure the slaves for themselves.⁠18

Wild Cat returned to the Seminole Nation in September, 1850 and held a council with the chiefs and headmen of his tribe. His visit caused much excitement among the Creeks, who greatly feared the enterprise and resource­fulness of the chief. Having opened a route to the Spanish country and familiarized the Negroes with it the Creeks were fearful that he would be the cause of many of their slaves running off to free  p264 Mexico. At the Seminole council Wild Cat endeavored to induce the tribe to follow him to Texas but the opposition of the authorities prevented many from going. He had succeeded in enlisting nearly a thousand Kickapoo Indians under his command and represented himself to be in a position where a combination of Indians could maintain themselves and set up a little Indian state in Mexico.⁠19 The Kickapoo allies of Wild Cat had purchased their powder and lead from the merchants at Little River, and Echo Hadjo, Creek head chief and Bill Hadjo second chief, ordered these merchants not to sell them any more ammunition.

The Creeks were greatly exercised and Chief McIntosh gave orders to arrest Wild Cat because of his threat to overturn the established order of affairs. When Wild Cat heard of the order for his arrest he called on DuVal and told him that he had a large force of Tawakoni, Kickapoo, and other Indians who were prepared to fight for him; that he was going to remain with his warriors on the south side of the Canadian River, prepared to fight McIntosh and the Lower Creeks, but he did not wish to have any trouble with the whites or the Upper Creeks.⁠20 The Creeks then abandoned their warlike demonstrations.

Before the end of the month Wild Cat set out for the Rio Grande with a few Seminole and about 100 Negroes. A large number of Creek warriors pursued but before they could overtake them the Negroes were attacked and captured by the Comanche Indians. When the  p265 Creeks came up with them they demanded possession of the captives who were delivered up only on the payment of ransom to the Comanche Indians. When the Creeks started to return to the Indian Territory with the Negroes the latter resisted and made an abortive effort to escape. A bloody encounter resulted in which a number of Negroes were wounded. On their return there were sixty captive Negroes in possession of the Creeks when on October 23, 1850 they passed Camp Arbuckle, where Dr. Rodney Glisan noted the number of wounded prisoners.⁠22 Wild Cat was not present when the capture of the Negroes was effected or the result of the encounter might have been different.

Other Seminole Negroes attempting to cross the plains and join Wild Cat on the Rio Grande, were massacred by the Comanche Indians. In one party every Negro except two girls was put to death. Those girls were taken to the camp where the Indians perpetrated the most inhuman barbarities upon them; among other fiendish atrocities the savages scraped through their skins into the flesh believing that beneath the cuticle the flesh was black like the color upon the exterior. They burned them with live coals to ascertain whether fire produced the same sensations of pain as with their own people, and tried various other experiments which were attended with most acute torture. The poor girls were most shockingly scarred and mutilated when Captain Marcy saw them in 1850. A Delaware trader had secured them from their captors and brought them to the Little River settlement when Marcy was there.⁠23

Upon inquiring of the Indians the cause of their hostility to the blacks they told Captain Marcy, with sardonic humor perhaps, that it was because they were slaves to the Creeks and the Indians were so sorry for them that they killed them to send them to a better world and release them from the fetters of bondage. But Captain Marcy thought their real motive was the fear that the Negroes would aid Wild Cat in building up a force on the Rio Grande that would interfere with the marauding operations of the Indians along the Mexican borders.

The Kickapoo Indians to the number of 500 emigrated from Missouri to the Canadian River where they remained for some years upon the land of the Creek Indians, after which they removed to the site upon  p266 which Fort Arbuckle was afterwards built. Here they remained until the winter of 1850‑51 when they all left for the Rio Grande and joined Wild Cat's colony.⁠24

Wild Cat's operations and his undoubted astuteness and influence with other Indians made him a figure to be reckoned with by the Government and in March, 1851 a commission was sent out to have a talk with him and other Indians in Texas. It was hoped to discover Wild Cat's real purpose and to determine the extent of mischief or of good he was capable of doing. The commission found the Seminole chief at Eagle Pass, Texas. He was temporarily staying in Mexico with his colony but denied that he was a permanent resident of that country. He said "his great father had given him land in Arkansas as a home and a burying ground for him and his people, on which they might hunt and raise corn and live in peace with their brothers, the Whites. But, he said, the Creek Indians had come upon his land and tried to involve him in difficulties; had stolen from him his Negroes, and to avoid a war he had left that place and started to search for a new home in Texas." And that when he had found it all his people in Arkansas would follow him. "He seemed," as he stated, "pressed down with care and anxiety on account of his people, and troubled because of the difficulties and doubts that surrounded him. He spoke with feeling, and his countenance gave proof of it. His manner was entirely respect­ful and kind; there was no insolence — no threats, no unkind reproaches, but expressions of deep friendship."⁠25

---

The Author's Notes:

1 Foreman, Indian Removal, op. cit.

2 The Seminole were owners of a large number of slaves who dreaded the "idea of being transferred from their present state of ease and comparative liberty to bondage and hard labor under overseers, on sugar and cotton plantations. They have always had a great influence over the Indians. They live in villages separate, and, in many cases, remote from their owners, and enjoying equal liberty with their owners, with the single exception that the slave supplies his owner annually, from the product of his little field, with corn, in proportion to the amount of the crop; and in no instance, that has come to my knowledge, exceeding ten bushels; the residue is considered the property of the slave. Many of these slaves have stocks of horses, cows, and hogs, with which the Indian owner never assumes the right to intermeddle. . . . An Indian would almost as soon sell his child as his slave, except when under the influence of intoxicating liquor. The almost affection of the Indian for his slave, the slave's fear of being placed in a worse condition, and the influence which the negroes have over the Indians, were used by the Government to induce their removal to the West where the continuance of this happy relation was promised them" (Wiley Thompson to secretary of war, April 27, 1855, American State Papers "Military Affairs" Vol. VI.534).

3 Jesup to secretary of war, July 1, 1848, OIA, Seminole file W 244.

4 Kappler, op. cit., II, 407.

5 Jones to commissioner of Indian affairs, January 30, 1849, OIA, Seminole file J 143.

6 Indian Removal, op. cit.

7 Gopher John was known to the army officers as John Warrior, John Coil, and John Cohia.

8 Gopher John to Jesup, June 10, 1848, OIA, Seminole file J 96 and 102.

9 Cherokee Advocate, June 5, 1848.

10 Flint to Drennan, August 13, 1849, AGO, OFD, 238 D 49.

11 Ibid., September 10, 1849.

12 In the autumn of 1846 about 650 Indians crossed the Red River on their way to the Colorado where they planned to spend the winter hunting. One company of 150 was commanded by Wild Cat who said he was going to hunt and treat with the Comanche Indians (Upshaw to Armstrong, October 6, 1846, OIA, "I. T. Misc. upshaw").

13 DuVal to Brown, November 5, 1849, OIA, "Florida" file D 251.

14 DuVal to Brown, May 30, 1850, OIA, "Seminole" file D 392.

15 Fort Smith Herald, March 2, 1850, p2, col. 2.

16 Idem.

17 Dent to Arbuckle, July 15, 1850, AGO, OFD, 135 A 50.

18 Drennan and Raiford to Lea, August 24, 1850, OIA, Seminole.

19 DuVal to Lea, September 30, 1850, ibid., D 392.

20 DuVal to Brooke, October 20, 1850, ibid., D 481.

21 Fort Smith Herald, October 11, 1850, p2, col. 3. Wild Cat was said to have been accompanied by a large number of allies from the prairies. The Creeks were much alarmed and a council of chiefs was called who ordered twenty-five men from each Creek town to report for service against Wild Cat and his allies (Indian Advocate, October 1850, p3).

22 Fort Smith Herald, November 1, 1850, p2, col. 2; Cherokee Advocate, November 19, 1850, p2, col. 5; Dr. Rodney Glisan, Journal of Army Life, 65.

23 Col. R. B. Marcy, Thirty Years' of Army Life on the Border, 55.

24 Marcy to Jones, November 25, 1851, AGO, OFD, 489 M 51.

25 "Memorandum of a conversation between Wild Cat of the Coachoochee and Cols. Cooper and Temple, Eagle Pass, Texas, March 27, 1851," OIA, "Misc. File" T 463.

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